Sirimavo Bandaranaike

Sirimavo Bandaranaike (17 April 1916-10 October 2000) was Prime Minister of Ceylon/Sri Lanka from 21 July 1960 to 25 March 1965 (interrupting Dudley Senanayake's two terms), from 29 May 1970 to 23 July 1977 (succeeding Senanayake and preceding J.R. Jayewardene), and from 14 November 1994 to 10 August 2000 (succeeding Chandrika Kumaratunga and preceding Ratnasiri Wickremanayake).

Biography
Sirimavo Bandaranaike was born in Balangoda, Ceylon on 17 April 1916, and she married S.W.R.D. Bandaranaike  in 1940. She became involved in politics upon her husband's assassination in 1959, becoming president of the social democratic Sri Lanka Freedom Party in May 1960. The wave of sympathy was so strong that months later she was made the world's first woman Prime Minister, despite her lack of political experience. She developed her late husband's neutralist policies further to the left, bringing the main Marxist group out of the opposition and into her government in 1964. In opposition, she formed the United Front with the Marxists and other left-wing groups, leading to her re-election. She severed the country's ties with the United Kingdom and proclaimed a new, socialist constitution. Her United Front collapsed in 1975 amidst signs of economic decline and civil unrest, and she lost the 1977 election; she was expelled from Parliament in 1980 for her abuse of power. She continued to command considerable respect, and, while she lost the 1988 presidential election, she won the 1994 elections to become Prime Minister, as her daughter Chandrika Kumaratunga held the presidency. She died two months after leaving office.